Amazon announced that it will now sell the two higher-end versions of the Kindle, the Kindle Fire HD and Kindle Fire HD 8.9″, in 170 countries. Today, pre-orders in 170 countries begins and the first models will be shipped out on June 13. Pricings of the models can be found here.

On other developments, it said that the Amazon Appstore will now be available in 200 countries. Up to now, the Android-based Appstore, which works both on Amazon’s Fire tablet range but also other Android devices, has only been available in the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, China and Japan, with Brazil next in line.

In a statement in response to the developments, Mike George, VP of Apps and Games at Amazon, said, “We are thrilled to be expanding the reach of our global app distribution to nearly 200 countries. By further expanding the distribution of apps to millions of customers around the world, we are continuing to make it easy for customers to enjoy their Amazon apps on Kindle Fire and any Android device.”

Do customers around the world feel the same? We will find out soon when feedback starts coming in.

The company has remained tight-lipped on how many tablets it has sold since launching the Kindle Fire range in 2011. However, Dave Limp, VP, Amazon Kindle, mentioned today that the Kindle Fire HD (the 7″ model) has been the company’s “#1 best-selling item in the world” since being launched.

Sounds like good stuff! Is it really? Time will tell…

Although the HD is available with an optional LTE component in the U.S. it looks like this rollout is WiFi-only. Like other Kindle Fire products, the two models launched for sale today will work with Amazon’s existing and wide range of content, including apps, films, TV, games and 300+ books “exclusive to the Kindle Store.”